From Bugzilla Helper: User-Agent: Mozilla/5.0 (X11; U; Linux i686; en-US; rv:1.2.1) Gecko/20030206 Description of problem: Disk druid offers ext2 but not ext3 as a file system option. Partitions that are pre-formatted as ext3 are recognised as such, but then disk druid grays out their mount point selection box, so they cannot be used unless they are reformatted to ext2. All in all, it is impossible to install on ext3. Version-Release number of selected component (if applicable): whatever is in 8.0.94 How reproducible: Always Steps to Reproduce: 1. Create an ext3-formatted partition 2. Start installing (graphical mode) 3. Use disk druid for partitioning 4. Attempt to create a new ext3 partition 5. Attempt to define a mount point for the existing ext3 partition
If you burned your CDs have you checked them? ext3 is always available unless there is a problem with the install media.
I had to install from a custom-made CD without checksums due to bug #85208. I attempted an installation on another machine from a standard and checked CD and, indeed, ext3 is there. This leaves two possibilities: either my custom CD is not OK, or something specifically on the epia makes anaconda think that ext3 is not available. After the no-ext3-available installation I converted my ext2 partitions to ext3. I did so with the kernel and tools that were installed from the questionable CD and everything worked fine. This suggests - but does not confirm - that nothing was wrong with the CD in the first place. The only place left to look in is the initrd of the CD itself. I haven't done that (but it is at http://www.provocation.net/bootdisk.img if you want to take a look). As things look now, I wouldn't bother investigating this further. Whatever the problem might be, it will go away anyway when #85208 gets fixed.
When you edit a preexisting partition in disk druid, you have the option of either preserving data or formatting the partition. You can select either option with the radio buttons in the edit dialog, but the default is to preserve data (i.e. not format). Unless you select the format option, the partition type drop down menu will remain disabled since changing the its value would require formatting. I cannot replicate the other problems you have listed. When you create a *new* partition in disk druid, is ext3 an option or not? When you edit a *preexisting* (on disk before install began) ext3 partition in disk druid and select the "format partition as:" radio button, does the partition type drop down remain greyed out? In exactly what situation is the mount point entry field disabled?
In my case: - If you have a pre-existing ext3 partition and you select to preserve the data, the "select mount point" box is grayed out, making it impossible to use that partition as part of the system at this stage (what you can do after the installation is finished is beyond the scope of this bug). - If you have a pre-existing ext3 partition and you select to re-format it, ext3 is not available as a format option, so you are forced to re-format as ext2. - If you create a new partition, ext3 is not available as format option and you can only format as ext2. Thus, all in all, no ext3 is possible either way. I wrote earlier "either my custom CD is not OK, or something specifically on the epia makes anaconda think that ext3 is not available". What I didn't think of then is that the obvious way to test which of the two it is, it to attempt to install from my custom CD on a non-epia machine. If ext3 is still not available, then it's my CD. If ext3 is available, then it's anaconda on the epia. I'll do that and report back. You can try it too; the CD image in question is up for grabs at http://www.provocation.net/epia.html .
I tried installing from the same CD on a non-epia machine and ext3 was not available. It is thus now very safe to assume that something is wrong with my installation CD. I strongly suggest a NOTABUG on this.
How does your custom CD differ fromt the stock RH CD? I might be able to help you get it working (although understand this is outside of what Red Hat officially supports).
I copied the entire CD to disk, commented out patch900 in the spec, made kernel RPMs, installed kernel-BOOT on a machine, moved vmlinux and initrd from there to the loop-mounted boot image of the CD, moved the i386 and i686 kernels to the RPMS directory, created a new iso image from the result, burned it and installed the epia from it. Thus, the difference between the two CDs is vmlinux and initrd in the boot image, kernels in the RPMS directory, plus the MD5 checksums I lost in the process. The kernel that got installed has no problems with ext3. Logically then, the problem must be in the BOOT kernel that I put in the boot image of the CD. Perhaps ext3 is excluded in that kernel? Anyway, I guess that all it takes to fix the CD is to replace the BOOT kernel in its boot image with a normal i386 kernel. The epia works fine by now though, so I haven't tried. Thanks for your willingness to help, I appreciate that.
I would guess that ext3 is not in all the places its needed. There are several modules.cgz files on the boot initrd and in the stage2.img and you need to update each with your new modules. These are cpio archives. Good luck.
Closing due to inactivity. If you have new information to add please reopen the issue report.